The Racquette

Issue date: 5/1/09 Section: College Life

E-Books are an alternative to printed books

For two semesters now, the College Book Store has been offering e-books as an alternative to printed books. By purchasing a card with a bar code on it, students can gain access to books online and download the book to their computer. Even though the response has been low so far, the concept has potential to grow. The owner of an e-book can make make notes and highlight text in the program used to view the book. The conceptual difference is that the book is read on a computer screen.

Melissa Tinklepaugh, a Senior Art History major, bought an e-book for one of her classes this semester. "I'm really happy that I found what would have been a $120 textbook as an e-book. The price was cut in half," Tinklepaugh said, highlighting the advantage of a lower price. "The e-book is easy to use. It's like having a pdf document of the textbook, except in CourseSmart's own viewing program. This works fine if you're okay with not holding a tangible book in your hands. With the CourseSmart e-book, I can make notes and highlight the text, similar to Adobe Acrobat. I like that there's a search tool, which makes finding a useful section of the text fast and easy," she continued, revealing the strong points of the product.

Except for being less expensive than a used textbook, there is no heavy book to carry around. If a printed copy of the book has gone out of stock at the College Store, there is immediate gratification with the e-book. It can be purchased right then and the student does not have to wait for a printed copy to arrive.

There are disadvantages to e-books as well. "The downside to an e-book is there are absolutely no returns for any reason. There is no buy back value. Once the book is downloaded, it is yours" said Janet Robbins, Textbook Manager at the College Book Store. Melissa Tinklepaugh also saw this as a downside, and added expiration date as a flaw. "The E-book I have expires in six months, so I have no chance of getting money back or keeping the book" she said, and pointed out some implications of said fault: "I wouldn't use E-books for course texts that cost less and could be sold back later, or for books I would keep for being useful to my studies."

So far, the response to the service has been low. "We have only sold a couple of copies at this point. Many students still prefer a paper book rather than a digital book that you read off the computer," said Robbins. However, she anticipated the number to slowly rise in upcoming years. For more information on e-books: contact Janet Robbins by phone at 315 267 2218, or via e-mail at robbinjl@potsdam.edu.

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